Kelsey Timmerman

Author, Speaker, Touron

One of the most talked about parts of WHERE AM I EATING? is when I freed a slave in Ivory Coast. This was the subject of an editorial in James Hallmark’s recent column in the Amarillo Globe-News titled Injustice must be confronted.

James writes:

“We have made helping easy in America, perhaps too easy. When a tornado strikes Oklahoma, we text “Red Cross” to 90999 and we have “helped.” We are asked to “like” a Facebook page and told doing so will help free little girls from sex trafficking. These small actions may indeed help and even be essential, but someone has to get their hands dirty to free slaves, liberate little girls from prostitution, or clean up a tornado’s damage.”

In 2012 Texas State freshmen read WEARING as part of their Common Experience — A Global Odyssey: Exploring Our Connections to the Changing World.

Dr. Salwa Khan with the School of Journalism & Mass Communication, had her students produce WEARING-themed segments. The segments explore if students think about where their clothes are made, how Texas State sources their athletic uniforms, feature University of Texas students who fought to get their university to sign on with the Worker Rights Consortium, and feature an interview with local clothing designer.

What I really enjoyed about each segment is that they took this global issue and talked about how it impacted their lives as locals.

I spent the previous night in the guest room of a gold miner who employed 15-year-old workers. The bus that was supposed to take me all the way to Ghana, had ended at a flooded road in Burkina Faso. We then took a dugout canoe across the road to a brakeless taxi to a city without a hotel.

The next morning I had to take the taxi back to the flooded road, which I crossed again in a dugout canoe to a bus that would take me to Ghana. That bus dropped me off in Pa, Burkina Faso, where I waited for a bus to Hamile, Ghana, that may or not show up.

I wanted a place to compile all that was said about the trip. This is that place.

Jennifer Sandler, Winthrop’s study abroad coordinator, as quoted on the Winthrop University website: The students were exposed to so many new experiences, ideas, situations and people, and they were nothing but engaged and enthusiastic the entire program. We were all sad to leave Guatemala, but I firmly believe that the students’ fire for travel and international experiences has been stoked, hopefully never to be extinguished.